Ayn Rand said that Kant said that reality and reason are incompatible.
Did Kant ever say that a man can follow only one of these two courses?
If you could provide references, I would be grateful.
Dr. Peikoffâs book The Ominous Parallels provides a good overview of Kantâs epistemology and ethics. Essentially, Kant said that reason is useless because the ârealâ reality is beyond our perception.
As to which of the two to follow, Kantâs basic guideline on human behavior is that man should do whatever makes him suffer. Even the act of self-sacrifice is rendered amoral if it is done with any personal motivation whatsoever, even if that motivation is the desire to be moral.
Duty, according to Kant, is the only proper motivation, and duty inherently means doing that which you strongly desire not to do. The stronger your desire not to do something, the more moral you are for doing it. Morality = Frustration.
Well, there is one thing that you have to understand when you say that Ayn Rand has said that Kant said X (that being whatever Kant said). When Ayn Rand says that Kant says something, she is giving it to you in clear-cut, essential terms. If you have read any Kant youâd quickly find that nothing Kant said was ever stated as clearly as Ayn Rand has made it.
This is not to say that Ayn Rand was ever wrong about Kant, far from it, she was dead on. But Kant buried the actual progressions, reasonings, deductions and conclusions of his philosophy under such pounds of intestinal verbiage, you simply have to read it to get any sense of it.
Yes, he did say this. But, you have to dig it up yourself if you really want to know what he actually said. It is more of a culmination of his philosophy, and it starts in his metaphysics, and ends in the horrific ethics.
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The only thing I read by Kant is his letter âWhat is Enligthenmentâ with the slogan âSapere Audeâ; dare to know. He critisizes his contempories for not thinking on their own, but relying on priests, physicians, kings etc to do it for them. Seems close to what I read in Atlas Shrugged.
Maybe Iâll read critique of Pure Reason some day to see what kantâs ideas where. Anyhow, I think ideas are important not philosophers. If Kant had strange ideas on metaphysics and ethics but defended free inquiry and speach like his letter suggest; I take the best and leave the rest.
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Maybe Iâll read critique of Pure Reason some day to see what kantâs ideas where. Anyhow, I think ideas are important not philosophers. If Kant had strange ideas on metaphysics and ethics but defended free inquiry and speach like his letter suggest; I take the best and leave the rest.
This would be a major error. There is no way to pluck ideas out of their context and have them retain their meaning, that is, their referents. Every non-axiomatic idea depends on its context. That is what context is: The other ideas that help determine the meaning of a particular idea.
And keep in mind that words are not ideas. Words are only labels for ideas. If Kant says he supports Vernunft (âreasonâ) and Ayn Rand says she supports reason, do not assume they mean the same thing. In this case, they definitely donât. They have about as much relation to each other as a quadraplegic has to an Olympic runner.
By all means read Critique of Pure Reason. I recommend the Cambridge combined first and second edition, edited and translated by Paul Guyer and Allen Wood. It has lots of background information and some commentary too. You will need all of that and more. Try A Kant Dictionary by Howard Caygill.
After you read it, be sure to report the results here, on ObjectivismOnline.
Ayn Rand said that Kant said that reality and reason are incompatible.
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Where did Ayn Rand say that?
I am happy and worn out to report that I have spent the past 6 weeks reading Kantâs Critique of Judgment (for a class which I chose), so that I can finally contribute to discussions such as this. I have another couple of weeks of reading left, and then I will have read the whole book from cover to cover. Aside from this his third critique, I have also read portions of the Critique of Pure Reason (in preparation for the Critique of Judgment).
Thoyd Loki is 100% correct. Since I am reading Kantâs work in which he discusses aesthetics, take this example. Ayn Rand called Kant the father of modern art; yet I am convinved that Kant would have hated Picasso, Pollock, and everything in between. I would not be all that surprised if he would have had problems even with impressionism. Obviously Ayn Rand did not, when reading Kant, come across some statement of his which approves of non-representational art. Philosophical detection is not so easy. What Ayn Rand DID do, I assume, is to focus on, as the essential, Kantâs denial of any objective principle for evaluating beauty. Taken in this light, Kantâs claims which might seem to exclude modern art do not matter, culturally.
I apologize if my writing has been negatively influenced by too much reading of Kant.
EDIT: I did not mean to say that Kantâs denial of an objective standard of beauty is the ONLY important clue to Kantâs role as father of modern art. Itâs also crucial to examine, for example, his comments on (artistic) geniuses [e.g., artistic genius is innate] and on interest in art as arising only in society.
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A fascinating bookâdiscussed in a lecture by Dr. Peikoffâis Madness and Modernism by Louis Sass. It traces the connections between modern art and postmodernists back to Kant.
Where did Ayn Rand say that?
Sorry for the late response. I couldnât find my For the New Intellectual.
I apologize for misquoting Ayn Rand as Ayn Rand did not say that. It was my interpretation as Kant said that the real ârealityâ is unknowable.
[Modâs note: merged with a previous thread. -sN]
For my ethics class, we finally (and loathefully) arrived at Kant. I have this assignment but I am drawing a blank for an example that would lead to a contradiciton. I need to do the following:
Give an example of how the universalization formula of the Categorical Imperative shows that an action is morally impermissible. You need to show how it leads to at least one type of contradiction.
As I said, I can think of lots of examples, but not necessarily how it would lead to a âcontradictionâ. I would like to approach it from an Objectivist standpoint. I think a good example would be something like how it is immoral to not share what you earn, and then show that it arrives at a contradiction. But what would that be? Is the act of sharing simply a contradiciton to manâs nature (which is to produce for his own well-being)?
It depends what is meant by a contradiction: I doubt they will accept a contradiction in the Objectivist sense of the term, it sounds more like they want a formal logical contradiction. But thatâs pretty hard to show - Kant believed that since the CI had been derived using purely a priori principles, it had fundamental status as a moral law, so that if the dictates of the CI conflicted with other moral frameworks then too bad for them. One of the more infamous examples of this is the argument that the CI-based rule stating âlying is always wrongâ commits Kant to the claim that it would be wrong to lie to a serial killer who was wanting to know where his next victim was hiding.
Such a well-meant lie can, however, also become by accident (casus) punishable in accordance with civil laws; but what escapes being punishable merely by accident can be condemned as wrong even in accordance with external laws. That is to say, if you have prevented someone just now bent on murder from committing the deed, then you are legally accountable for all the consequences that might arise from it. But if you have kept strictly to the truth, then public justice can hold nothing against you, whatever the unforeseen consequences might be. It is possible that after you have answered âYesâ to the murdererâs question as to whether his enemy is at home, the latter has nevertheless gone out unnoticed, so that he would not meet the murderer and the deed would not be done; but if you had lied and said that he is not at home, and he has actually gone out (though you are unaware of it), so that the murderer encounters him while going away and perpetrates his deed on him, then you can by right be prosecuted as the author of his death (Kant, On a supposed right to lie from philanthropy, 8:426-427)
(you can find various arguments about what precisely Kant is committing himself to on google: http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=kant+lying, not everyone accepts that this conclusion actually follows from the CI)
But while this is pretty disgusting, its not a formal contradiction. I think the question is really vague, Iâm not entirely sure what its asking. Iâd ask for clarification personally.
This is what I ended up writing. Thi professor is terrible IMO because he is always vague and never tells us what his expectations are. He doesnât even give a minimum word requirement, allowing some students to literally write two sentences on an assignment. Oh well, as long as I get a good grade, I donât care.
Immanuel Kant argued a concept he labeled the Categorical Imperative. The maxim of this is that an action is morally impermissible if you can at the same time will (desire) that it become a universal law. This basically means that if you do it, you must also want everyone else to behave in the same manner. For example, letâs imagine a man who desires the possessions of his neighbor, but lacks the motivation to acquire similar possessions for himself through honest means. If a person acted upon his desire to steal, he would therefore also have to accept that it would be morally permissible for everyone else to steal from him. If everyone were allowed to take whatever they wished from others without consent, there could be no concept of private property. Indeed, even oneâs own home could be taken at whim whenever someone else chose to do so. In such a scenario, society itself would break down. It would become necessary for an âevery man for himselfâ attitude whereby everyone would be on constant watch to protect his own possessions from his neighbors. If such a maxim were universal, mankind itself would descend into the stone ages and humans would be reduced to mere animals, defending territory and guarding possessions with deadly force against intruders. Social interaction would be nearly impossible out of fear of leaving oneâs own territory unprotected. It also seems improbable that such a scenario could allow for foundations of trust between men. As such, the Categorical Imperative would not permit such actions as stealing your neighborâs possessions.
This is what I ended up writing.
I think that was a fairly good example of how Kant would like someone following the Categorical Imperative to think. And this has gotten into our popular culture, as one of the things my mother would tell us as we were growing up is: âWhat if everybody acted that way?â And she never read Kant as far as I know.
But the real contradiction in the Categorical Imperative is that man is an end in himself, he is an individual, and morality ought to be about how he can best survive and thrive. Making a moral imperative by having to relate oneself to everyone else is far too altruistic and non-selfish for it to work. It is a contradiction to manâs factual nature. If one was marooned on a deserted island, one would still need a rational morality, even though there isnât anyone else there to take into account. Kant was attempting to assert of social relativism onto everyone, giving the impression that this would make it objective, even though it isnât based on the factual nature of man and what is required to live, and to live well. In order to do that, he must be reality oriented, and Kant said we have no access to reality with either our sense or our mind, not even some kind of indirect access to real reality. Basically, if all one needs to take into account is other people and how they would act doing the same thing, there is no sufficient focus on reality and manâs nature. Thatâs the contradiction, but I agree that your professor would probably not accept that type of an answer.
Wow thatâs the most concise argument against C.I. that I think is possible! That really makes everything very clear. My survey of philosophy class is also going to get to Kant later in the semester, so Iâll be sure to use the points youâve given when I address it again down the road.
Wow thatâs the most concise argument against C.I. that I think is possible!
Thanks. Just keep in mind that the Objectivist ethics stem from the actual facts about manâs nature and the requirements of living in reality; which is what makes it objective. And taking everyone else into account is really subjective second-handedness. Notice also that one doesnât know what to do oneself, let alone what everyone else would or ought to do by Kantâs kind of pseudo-ethics. If the individual existing man qua man is not the standard, then it has to be either intrinsic or subjective. Kantâs idea of universalization attempts to make the globally subjective the focal point and makes it a form of intrinsicism in the process â Though ought to act as if it would be OK for everyone else to act that way. It is altruism run amuck. One ought to be concerned for oneself, and not everyone else in the process of making a moral decision.
Immanuel Kant argued a concept he labeled the Categorical Imperative. The maxim of this is that an action is morally impermissible if you can at the same time will (desire) that it become a universal law.
You said it backwards. The maxim is that an action is morally permissible if and only if it can be willed to be a universal law. Also, your professor might have translated will to mean desire, and if so never mind thisâbut I would avoid equating will with desire in Kant. The connotations of desire seem too close to inclination, which is one type of motivator, but one that Kant tried to avoid (though not very well really).
This basically means that if you do it, you must also want everyone else to behave in the same manner. For example, letâs imagine a man who desires the possessions of his neighbor, but lacks the motivation to acquire similar possessions for himself through honest means. If a person acted upon his desire to steal, he would therefore also have to accept that it would be morally permissible for everyone else to steal from him. If everyone were allowed to take whatever they wished from others without consent, there could be no concept of private property. Indeed, even oneâs own home could be taken at whim whenever someone else chose to do so. In such a scenario, society itself would break down. It would become necessary for an âevery man for himselfâ attitude whereby everyone would be on constant watch to protect his own possessions from his neighbors. If such a maxim were universal, mankind itself would descend into the stone ages and humans would be reduced to mere animals, defending territory and guarding possessions with deadly force against intruders. Social interaction would be nearly impossible out of fear of leaving oneâs own territory unprotected. It also seems improbable that such a scenario could allow for foundations of trust between men. As such, the Categorical Imperative would not permit such actions as stealing your neighborâs possessions.
This argument is Kantian_ish_, but again I think you have included a much greater focus on desire (inclination) than Kant would have allowed. The way Kant usually argued his categorical imperatives, it is not merely *undesirable* for a person to violate the maxim if it were a universal law, but rather *impossible*. I think thatâs what your teacher meant when he asked you to show how the violation would lead to a âcontradiction.â One example Iâve seen used is lying (I donât remember if this was an example Kant actually used or just someone explaining Kant).
If lying were a universal law, then that would mean that everything that everybody says is a lie. But if that were so, it would actually be impossible, because it would mean simply that when someone says something, the opposite of their statement is the truth. So everything would be the truth, which is a contradiction to everything being a lie. It is therefore literally impossible, not merely undesirable, for lying to be willed a universal law. (I know that argument is somewhat problematic, but thatâs one that Iâve seen as an example before).
In order to do that, he must be reality oriented, and Kant said we have no access to reality with either our sense or our mind, not even some kind of indirect access to real reality.
Actually, Kant did claim that some knowledge of the noumenal realm could be deduced. He was heavily criticized for this, and it is quite inexplicable in the context of the rest of his philosophy. But there are three basic metaphysical concepts Kant derived from âreal reality,â as he saw it, and those were God, freedom (volition), and immortality (the indestructibility of the soul). As to how he derived those concepts and what they mean exactly in his philosophy, someone with a much better understanding of Kant than I would have to explain..
You said it backwards
Oops, youâre right. Hopefully the professor will realize that was a typo.
One example Iâve seen used is lying
Part of the assignment was that we couldnât use one of the examples given in the reading, we had to come up with our own. The lying one was not directly in the reding, but there were others that seems to overlap so I wanted to do something else.
Concerning KevinDW78âs asking for an example of a contradiction in the CI, Kantâs CI is in essence a Utilitarian imperative, at least as Kant himself elaborated on it. For Kant it is the general consequence in society, that is, the utility, of an act that is the standard of whether one treats it as an imperative or not. At one point in one version of the CI Kant himself talks about social harmony as the criterion of whether an act should be an imperative! Thus a contradiction in at least one version of the CI is that it is not actually a priori, at least in deciphering its moral dimension. In other words, Kant was, against his own conscious intention, ultimately a Utilitarian, just like Hume, the difficulties posed by whom Kant wrongly thought he was answering with his CI.
Lying is the common troublesome example given of Kantâs CI. But that is an epistemological explanation. Most examples of contradiction inherent in the CI would be some practical action or other. Thus my emphasis on its ultimate Utilitarianism as the paradigm contradiction inherent in the CI.
I will be publishing the foregoing in my forthcoming book the primary aim of which is to present my solution to the central problem of ethics, the is-ought problem, a feat which even Aristotle said was impossible of being performed. I found the study of ethics without first a solution to this problem impossible to bear. So I solved it. When philosophers see my solution, which is a single logical connection based on a single observable fact, they will wonder why Aristotle didnât see the same thing or why it took a composer of music and an amateur in philosophy like myself to finally solve it after 2,400 years of philosophers failing to perform the same feat. Copyright June 2008/[email protected]
Concerning KevinDW78âs asking for an example of a contradiction in the CI, Kantâs CI is in essence a Utilitarian imperative, at least as Kant himself elaborated on it. For Kant it is the general consequence in society, that is, the utility, of an act that is the standard of whether one treats it as an imperative or not. At one point in one version of the CI Kant himself talks about social harmony as the criterion of whether an act should be an imperative! Thus a contradiction in at least one version of the CI is that it is not actually a priori, at least in deciphering its moral dimension. In other words, Kant was, against his own conscious intention, ultimately a Utilitarian, just like Hume, the difficulties posed by whom Kant wrongly thought he was answering with his CI.
Kant definitely wasnt a utilitarian. The whole point of Kants ethics is that the CI is objectively true in the same sense that the laws of arithmetic are true, namely that it is graspable by a rational mind using logic and reason alone, and does not require justification by empirical reality. Although Kant probably did believe that universal adherence to the CI would result in a better society, he never made an attempt to justify the CI on utilitarian/psychological/sociological grounds - his argument is entirely logical in nature. For Kant, the reason why you should accept the CI isnt because itll improve your life or because itâll make the world a better place - you should accept it because its a brute fact in the same way that 2+2=4 is a brute fact. Asking âwhy should I act according to the CI?â is (for Kant) akin to asking âWhy should I accept that 5+5=10?â - you should accept it because its demonstrably true regardless of the effect that it has on the world, and refusing to accept it just because it may have an adverse effect on your life is intellectually dishonest. Kant believed that the consequences of actions were morally neutral - as long as an action was in accord with the CI, it was ipso facto moral regardless of what effect it had on the world.